


begin to breathe in

by kismetNemesis



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, M/M, Multi, don't worry he is dating blue too, extreme fluff, i'm just hesitant to put this in the bluesey tag when it doesn't really involve her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-02-06
Packaged: 2018-05-18 16:20:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5934913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kismetNemesis/pseuds/kismetNemesis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gansey is kind of a romantic at heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	begin to breathe in

**Author's Note:**

> Then looking upwards  
> I strain my eyes and try  
> To tell the difference between shooting stars and satellites  
> From the passenger seat as you are driving me home.
> 
> \- Death Cab for Cutie, Passenger Seat

A few months ago, Gansey had articulated several things to himself at once. The first was that he loved all his friends in the way he loved Blue, in the way most people would call “more than friends.” But all five of them knew what they had was more than a typical friendship; it just didn’t necessarily imply romance. 

The second was that he actually _did_ want to imply romance with several of his male friends, and that meant that he was maybe romantically interested in men, though it seemed kind of silly to think of them as men rather than boys. Gansey could still picture fifteen-year-old Ronan with ease, but more and more he pictured Ronan’s bare back or the teasing curve of his smile (not to mention the freckles on Adam’s neck or what it would feel like to kiss a certain ghost).

Gansey had called Blue to confess his newfound sexuality, worrying that she’d see it as a betrayal or an incitement to jealousy. Instead she’d laughed, not unkindly, and reminded him that she’d been raised by three women in love. In fact, her mother would probably sigh with relief to hear that Blue was in some kind of polyblob as opposed to a monogamous heterosexual relationship. She hadn’t raised Blue that way. After Gansey had finished spluttering, Blue convinced him that they should go for it. To be fair, she pointed out, it would resolve a lot of jealousy problems, and besides the sooner they asked the sooner they could tell Adam how great he was to his face instead of having an hours-long phone conversation about his best features (of which there were many). She sounded entirely confident over the phone, though she told him later that she’d had to dig her nails into her palm to keep from shaking with nerves.

In this way Blue, Gansey, and Noah (who had shown up the second they started talking about romance) came up with a plan to seduce Adam and Ronan that ended up involving weeks of hinting, flirting, and awkward conversations until everything came to a head at Nino’s, of all places. Six hours, one almost-fight, three emotional outbursts, and two car rides later, the five of them were dating. 

Gansey woke up the next morning buzzing with anticipation and anxiety. He almost convinced himself that it had been a dream until Ronan nonchalantly sat beside him at breakfast and asked, smirking, “Do you really think I’m, quote, ‘unfairly attractive’?” Gansey put his head on the table and groaned. 

“Yes, you narcissist,” he mumbled into his arms. While cathartic, last night had been embarrassing for everyone. Remembering Adam trying to kiss him (on the cheek? on the lips?) and missing because Gansey turned his head away too quickly both filled Gansey with a joyous glow and made him want to punch his past self in the face. Similarly, glancing up at Ronan’s shit-eating grin made him roll his eyes while secretly gloating that his attraction meant something to Ronan.

Ronan passing him the milk suddenly had so much more significance, and Noah’s arm around his shoulders had never felt heavier, or better. Gansey frowned to see that Ronan’s meal consisted of only a slice of toast. 

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” Gansey reminded him, trying his best to imitate his mother’s commanding tone.

“Yes, darling,” said Ronan, trying for sarcastic but ending up affectionate.

“Wedded bliss,” commented Noah smugly. 

“This is no different than usual,” said Gansey.

“Exactly.” Noah giggled as they exchanged sheepish glances.

They all three piled in the Pig for school without having to cajole Ronan even once. It occurred to Gansey that maybe commuting with his boyfriends would make a difference in Ronan’s attendance record. 

“I doubt it,” said Noah, replying to his thought. “I think this is a honeymoon-phase thing.”

“What?” said Ronan from the passenger seat.

“Don’t worry about it,” Noah reassured him as they pulled up in front of Aglionby. Gansey moved to unbuckle his seatbelt.

“Wait,” Ronan said suddenly, making Gansey freeze in the middle of his motion. Without preamble, without even pausing to make sure no one was looking, Ronan leaned over and kissed Gansey swiftly and chastely, as if he’d done it a thousand times before. Before Gansey could react, Ronan was slamming his door shut and hurrying into the school. Noah was giggling.

“You’re bright red,” observed Noah gleefully. Gansey touched his lips where Ronan had kissed him and stared off into space. “You’re going to be the one with an attendance record if you don’t get in there.”

“Uh, thanks,” Gansey replied, resigning himself to a day of agonized waiting. If he’d thought school paled in comparison to his friends before, this was a distraction like no other he’d ever experienced.

-

It took until halfway through the ride home for Gansey to find his words and a safe place to express them.  
“Ronan,” he started carefully, “what was that, uh, this morning about?”

“The kiss?” Gansey nodded, keeping his eyes on the road.

“I like you, idiot,” said Ronan calmly. “Was that not clear?”

“No, I mean, I know _that_ ,” Gansey stammered. “I just mean- why then? Why there?”

“Why not there?”

“Because- Ronan, that was my first kiss!” 

“It was?” Ronan seemed amused. “What about all those girls you used to date?”

“Come on, Ronan. Would you just kiss a random girl?”

“I’m gay, Gansey.”

“Well, you know what I mean!” said Gansey, turning hot with embarrassment. Neither of them acknowledged that this was the first time Ronan had ever said something like that to Gansey. “I don’t want my kisses to be random. I want them to be romantic,” he clarified, immediately self-conscious of his admission. 

“If it makes you feel better, my first kiss wasn’t romantic either.”

“Who was it with?” asked Gansey, surprised. 

“Noah. It was a few weeks ago, actually,” said Ronan. A quick glance at him revealed that he was staring at his hands, not quite as composed as he sounded. “He, um, asked me if I wanted to practice kissing.” He startled a laugh out of Gansey.

“Oh, my god. What are you, thirteen?” 

“Shut up, Mr. _Romance_.” Gansey sighed, and both of them lapsed into a comfortable silence until Gansey pulled over to the side of the road, nowhere near Monmouth. Ronan raised an eyebrow. Gansey unbuckled and began the delicate process of climbing into Ronan’s lap.

“I just want to see if that practice paid off,” he said, straddling Ronan’s hips and not quite believing his own daring. Ronan grinned and rose up to kiss him for the second time.

-

An hour later they came back to Monmouth, still vaguely sweaty and rumpled. Gansey gave thanks that Noah was still apparently off with Blue somewhere. Speaking of those two, Gansey remembered that Noah had been Blue’s first kiss, too. For a dead kid, Noah seemed to be surprisingly irresistible. Well, it wasn’t like Gansey didn’t want to kiss him, too. 

Gansey made Ronan eat a snack before he left to go see Adam and do god knows what, then sat down on his bed and happily set to a book of Welsh poetry. Any mention of romance he would have previously taken in stride somehow set his heart beating, and he shook his head at how easily falling in love changed his perceptions. Before, any sex or romance he pictured was faceless and anonymous, but now he felt phantom impressions of Ronan’s fingers slipping under his shirt and shivered to imagine any of the others doing the same. 

He wanted to pretend to kiss Blue, to see her gasp and smile for once instead of scowling. He wanted to kiss Adam. He wanted to see Noah kiss Blue, and- he realized that his book had tumbled out of his hands unheeded. 

God, he was pathetic, and god, he was lucky. 

-

Ronan returned from seeing Adam fairly vibrating with happiness. Some kind of vine was caught on the back of his shirt. The sight of it put Gansey in mind of a word Blue had taught him: compersion, taking pleasure in someone else’s romantic relationship. It wasn’t in the dictionary, but when Gansey had informed Blue of this, she’d taken the dictionary from him and hit him with it.

“How’d it go?” Ronan just smiled and disappeared into his room, which Gansey took to mean “well.” It seemed like Gansey would be alone for the rest of the night, so he changed into pajamas in the quick way he’d learned living in a public space. Only after he pulled on his pants did he realize that being unclothed at home might have an entirely different connotation now. As he was scolding himself for having such a hair-trigger libido, someone knocked on the door.

He felt, rather than guessed, that it was Adam. Maybe it was the way he knocked, or maybe Gansey’s imagination had begun granting him wishes. Either way, Adam stood on the threshold, looking lovely, as always, and awake, which was more unusual. The sudden nearness of him made Gansey almost dizzy, and he rushed forward to hug him. It wasn’t an intimacy they’d allowed themselves before, so the smell of Adam’s shampoo and the faint awareness of his heartbeat were new delights.

“Happy to see you too,” Adam mumbled into his hair. Gansey broke off and stood a ways back, suddenly unsure what to do with his hands.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, then winced at the harshness of his phrasing. Luckily, Adam didn’t seem offended, though he didn’t come inside, either. “It’s late.”

“Do you want to go for a drive?” said Adam, ignoring him. The Ronan-ness of his question caught Gansey off guard. 

“Alright.” Adam took his hand and pulled him through the door without giving him time to grab his phone or tell Ronan where he was going. He considered protesting, but he was starting to think that Ronan’s smug looks might have meant he was in on this. Besides, he was reluctant to give up holding Adam’s hand. 

He let go of his hand once they got into Adam’s car, but it was worth it to watch Adam watch the road. His driving concentration had always fascinated Gansey. Where Ronan seemed to look anywhere but the road in front of him, Adam seemed to be doing a textbook sweep of the front, sides, back, and then front again. Gansey guessed he might have actually learned it in a textbook.

“How was your day?” asked Adam. 

“Wonderful,” Gansey replied. God, all this honesty and communication (something Blue had stressed over and over) was going to leave him permanently flustered.

“Ronan said he was worried he’d dreamt it.”

“I was frightened when I woke up too,” admitted Gansey. “It seems too good to be true.”

“I mean, me too. I mean- I’m glad it’s real.”

“It is real. I like you.”

“I like you too,” Adam said softly. Gansey’s heart was pounding.

“Imagine if Ronan dreamed up copies of us that he was dating, though,” Gansey mused.

“Do you think they’d come with their own cars?” asked Adam, smiling. They both laughed.

“I suspect they wouldn’t be entirely accurate,” Gansey began. Flirting with Blue had always felt like a debate that he had already lost, and flirting with Ronan felt like a wrestling match, but flirting with Adam felt a lot more like the sad attempts at dates he’d tried with any number of random girls. Normally, he’d fish around for something to compliment. Their hair, their dresses, whatever. He’d never actually had strong feelings about a dress, but he was full to bursting with nice things to say about Adam.

“Oh, no?”

“I don’t believe a dream copy would be as pretty as you,” Gansey blurted. “I mean, as beautiful as you! As handsome. Fuck.”

“Don’t worry about it, I’m not so concerned about the masculinity of compliments.” Adam sounded amused, but when Gansey gathered the courage to look at him, he was blushing. It _was_ pretty. Fidgeting with his seatbelt, Gansey realized that most of the romantic moments he’d experienced had happened to him in cars. His life was ridiculous.

He felt even more ridiculous when Adam stopped the car and led him into Cabeswater (of course) barefoot. After he stepped on a few twigs, Adam glanced at him apologetically. Soon enough, his footsteps started landing on soft moss no matter where they fell. Even without the portable greenery carpet and the temperature slowly growing warmer around him, the experience would have felt magical just because of Adam’s presence. They were holding hands again. Gansey never wanted to let go.

Dewy grass brushed Gansey’s toes, and he looked up to realize they were in the middle of a perfectly circular field. Overhead, a huge full moon hovered anachronistically. It was a midsummer full moon, despite the time of year back in the ordinary world.

“Why are we here?” he asked Adam in a reverential whisper. “Some kind of magic?”

“You could say that,” Adam replied, just as quietly. He took both of Gansey’s hands and closed his eyes. As he inhaled, Gansey watched the movement of his chest; as he exhaled, the clearing filled with fireflies. 

“Oh,” Gansey breathed. He wished fervently he was not wearing pajama bottoms printed with little sailboats. 

Adam opened his eyes and smiled. Gansey felt like the moon, glowing in response to the fervent shine of Adam’s sun. He opened his mouth to tell Adam so, but his breath caught as Adam lifted a hand to caress his cheek. 

Adam was going to kiss him. Gansey kept his eyes open for as long as he could, wanting to have as much detail as possible to remember later. The low light, the exact shape of Adam’s mouth, the stray eyelash on his cheek... 

Realizing that his wide-eyed anticipation was probably unbecoming, he let his eyes close just in time for Adam’s lips to touch his. The world narrowed down to the lack of space between them, to the hand moving to the small of Gansey’s back. Adam pulled him closer, deepening the kiss, and Gansey threw his arms around his neck, leaning up onto his tiptoes to get a better angle.

Staying pressed close as possible, Gansey broke off to gulp air, then began covering every inch of Adam’s face with kisses, straying down towards his neck as he’d done with Ronan in the car earlier. Ronan had gasped, and so did Adam, but Adam dissolved into breathless laughter. Gansey wanted to wrap that sound around him and use it as a blanket, but he just rested his cheek on Adam’s shoulder and reveled in his warmth. 

“How was that for romantic?” asked Adam, breaking the silence. Gansey shook his head, noticing that several flowers had bloomed around them.

“Adam, you are magnificent. Do you know that?” Gansey demanded. Adam hugged him tighter. If he had to stay in one place forever, Gansey thought, this was a strong contender for his first choice. Something about Adam’s phrasing caught up to him. “Wait. Did Ronan put you up to this?”

“He did say you were going on about romance,” Adam admitted. “But the, um, specifics were my idea.” Gansey pulled Adam’s face back to his and kissed him hard. He kind of tasted like mint, which made Gansey feel a strange thrill in his stomach.

Eventually, they began to make their way back to the car. Holding hands didn’t seem like enough contact, and Gansey melted when Adam stopped and pinned him to a tree about halfway back. The weather shifted back to normal, but Gansey was sure the feeling of magic would never go away.

-

He couldn’t fall asleep. Every time his eyes closed, he saw fireflies. Every time he started to drift off, he heard Blue’s voice saying that she wanted to pretend. Even Noah’s stupid remarks about his and Ronan’s domesticity were playing on repeat in his head. 

It was after midnight, but when he whispered “Noah?” Noah was there.

“Hi Gansey,” he said, soft and quiet in the darkness. Gansey sat up, feeling blindly for his glasses, and spotted him standing at the end of his bed. 

“I hope I’m not inconveniencing you.”

“Blue already went to sleep.”

“Is that where you were all day?” Noah nodded. Gansey envied him the ability to sidestep the usual parent- and bedtime-related concerns of a boyfriend, but of course it was not worth the price. “Come here,” he said, patting the mattress next to him. He could feel it dip as Noah clambered on, and wondered about the physics of ghosts obeying gravity.

Once Noah reached the top of the bed, Gansey slid back down onto the pillow, pulling Noah with him. They lay facing each other, side by side. Gansey studied the smudge on his cheek and wished he could hear Noah’s thoughts the same way Noah could sometimes hear his. Well, the next best thing to do was ask.

“Can I kiss you?”

“Yeah.” Noah closed his eyes. Gansey propped himself up on an elbow and did it. It was cold, but entirely pleasant. Both of them were smiling by the time Gansey let himself drop back down. 

“Is that why you called me here? Two make-out sessions in a day not enough?” Noah teased. 

“No! I just wanted to be the one to kiss first, for once.” 

“I can’t believe Ronan was your first kiss.”

“Hypocrite.”

“I wanted to be your first.” Gansey’s eyes widened, and Noah’s lips curved in contentment, but not amusement. He was serious.

“Somehow I’m always surprised when y’all say things like that,” said Gansey. He bit his lip.

“We love you,” said Noah simply. Gansey kind of wanted to cry, but instead he curled into Noah’s chest and let out a shuddering sigh. 

“I love you too.” Noah kissed the top of his head. Just before he fell asleep, Gansey felt Noah take off his glasses and place them carefully on the bedside table.

-

The next morning was much the same as any other at Monmouth. Gansey was tired from insomnia, and reluctant to attend school, but he’d woken up to Noah banging around in the kitchen and got Ronan to flip his sweater back from inside out with minimal argument. 

Driving to school was beautiful. The Pig had no problems, and Gansey rolled down a window to feel the wind. He could see Noah relaxing in the back, and Ronan apparently lost in thought in the passenger seat. 

Gansey got out of the car first, and hurried around to the other side before Ronan could even get unbuckled. As he straightened up, Gansey caught a glimpse of his confusion before he grabbed the collar of Ronan’s shirt and pulled him down for a kiss. 

It was anything but chaste, and Gansey felt like he could do it a hundred times and never get tired. Still, he broke off after a few seconds and hurried away. Without looking back, he could hear Noah’s laughter and picture Ronan’s red face with no trouble. 

“Bye, darling!” he called. He couldn’t wait for the school day to be over.

**Author's Note:**

> This got so much longer than I planned. Whoooo. 
> 
> I didn't include a scene with Blue, since this is very much meant to match their existing pretend-kissing scene in canon.
> 
> Thanks to all my TRC friends on twitter for encouragement, and especially Zee for linking me her playlist (check it out at 8tracks.com/zeegoeshere/coming-home-to-you).


End file.
